Love, Law, Light - The Three Pillars of Christian Ethics - Romans 13:8-14

Introduction

Having concluded his directives regarding the Christian’s relationship to government, he now turns to a summary statement that effectively summarizes the entirety of the practical portion of Romans up until this point.

Paul has given instruction on our relationship to God, our relationship to our church at a corporate level, our relationship to other Christians at an individual level, our relationship to unbelievers at an individual level, and our relationship to the government as a divinely established entity.

Paul’s emphasis has been this:

Paul now zooms out and captures the essence of all his teaching up to this point in these final 7 verses.

I believe an argument can be made that Paul provides here the most succinct summary of Christian ethics anywhere in the Bible, other than perhaps Jesus’ two great commandments, which Paul actually utilizes here.

So let’s examine this text and see what Paul has to say to us today.

The Obligation of Love - 13:8a

Paul starts right off the bat with a fun statement here in verse 8.

He instructs the church to owe nothing to anyone. Paul is actually using a little play on words to make his transition here from the Christian’s dealings with the government to the Christian’s dealings with all people by connecting the idea of “owing” something to someone else to the idea of “owing” taxes in verse 7. How does he do it? In verse 8, the word “owe” is the Greek work opheilo. That’s the the verb form of the noun opheilie, which is translated in verse 7 “what is due them.”

So here’s what he’s saying: in verse 7, pay off all your debts. In verse 8, having paid and continuing to pay all your debts, whether taxes or otherwise, realize this: you have a debt that is unpayable. Pay everything else off, but understand this: you have an obligation so great that you will never fully meet it in this lifetime, and Paul argues elsewhere that you will never fully meet it in the next either.

So what is the unpayable debt? What is the singular obligation of the Christian life? It is to love one another. Paul’s wording here is in the plural at every turn, demonstrating that Paul is speaking to the entire corporate group - the church.

Paul is also layering a kind of singular exclusivity into this as well: have no obligations except this one. When stated in the positive, he’s really saying something like this: this obligation of the Christian to love is so great, it’s as if it is his only obligation. What’s interesting is that if Christians take this singular obligation seriously, there are vast implications in every area of their lives. John Piper points out these implications by looking backward even just to verse 7:

Sermons from John Piper (2000–2014) Love is a Fulfilling of the Law, Part 1

What would that mean? It would probably mean: any time you have a debt of honor, you should pay it in love. Every payment of honor should be a payment of love. Every act of honoring should be an act of loving. Don’t pay debts of honor except as love payments. Owe no one honor except as a form of love.

And if that’s what verse 8 means about honor in relation to love, it’s probably also what it means about taxes and revenue and respect in relation to love. So Paul would be saying, Every debt that you owe to anybody—whether taxes or revenue or respect or honor—let every payment of that debt be an expression of love.

This love is conveyed by that well-known word that some of you who have been with us on Thursdays are familiar with - agapao.

Who remembers how we might define this agapa, agape type of love?

I would say agapa speaks of the highest levels of sacrificial devotion and intense affection.

Paul gives us two categories of people here as the objects of Christian love. What are they?

The first is one another - these are your fellow Christians.

The second is your neighbor - anyone who you come in contact with over the course of your day to day activities.

Paul transitions into the second part of verse 8 by saying that he who loves his neighbor fulfills the law.

Paul therefore equates love for one another with fulfillment of the law, leading us into our second point.

The Fulfillment of the Law - 13:8b-10

The reason that love for others is the highest obligation of the Christian, according to Paul, is this: love for one another is fulfillment of the Law.

The word pepleroken in the Greek, here translated fulfill, is a stronger term than just “obedience.” The word that the New Testament typically uses for obey is the word hypakuou, but Paul doesn’t use that here. His intent is richer and more complete. The best way to think about this would be that to obey is to do the bare minimum to pass, while to fulfill is to complete or fill up to the highest possible degree.

It would seem then that Paul is saying, as he has elsewhere in Romans, that the keeping of the Law is the highest obligation of the Christian. Everything we are and everything we have ought to devoted to this one obligation of law-fulfilling love.

We see this concept of fulfillment fleshed out in the ministry of Christ. We are familiar with His declaration that He did not come to abolish the Law but to fulfill it in Matthew 5:17. We also see Jesus repeatedly strike down the Pharisee’s interpretation of the Law in “obedience” terms and tell them that the way of Law-fulfillment is actually far more stringent than their ethics of “minimum obedience” could possibly be. Jesus’ ethical teaching therefore often followed the pattern of: “You have heard it said, but I say to you.” Fulfillment of the law, therefore, is an even greater obligation than mere obedience.

So how does Paul really nail this idea down? He goes straight to the Ten Commandments. He mentions commandments 6, 7, 8, and 10, and lest you think that you are in fact allowed to bear false witness against another person and not honor your father and mother, he extends it by saying “if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this word: you shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

Now we examined this commandment in depth a few weeks ago in 1 John, so I will revisit some of those points here.

Paul speaks in unison with John, as well as Moses and Jesus Himself in saying that the Christian’s entire code of ethics is effectively summed up in this single phrase: love your neighbor as yourself. This phrase becomes for Paul the grid or framework by which he understands everything that the Christian ought to do in relation to others.

Having explained in positive terms - love one another - he now explains it in negative terms - do not work evil against a neighbor.

Paul then makes a corollary statement: if love does not work evil against a neighbor, then love is the fulfillment of the law. In other words, law and love work in tandem to oppose evil. In fact, for Paul, love and law on the one hand cannot coexist with evil on the other. They are mutually exclusive.

The Dawning (Donning) of the Light - 13:11-14

Paul then moves on in verse 11 to give the reason for the obligation of love and the fulfillment of the law.

Paul’s rationale is layered, so hang tight as we follow his argument.

The first part is this: we fulfill the law by loving one another because we know the the time.

What does Paul mean by knowing the time? Simply, Paul says we are to love one another because we know we are living in the last days. The eschaton is upon us, Christ’s return is imminent, and we know this, or at least we ought to, and so we love one another by fulfilling the Law.

Paul then further describes our knowledge of the time as awakening from sleep. The hour is upon us to wake up.

Now what is meant by this? This word here can carry two primary meanings in the New Testament. The first is that of resurrection. We see this word translated as raise up, rise up, risen from the dead, etc. perhaps heard most famously in the words of the angel at the tomb: he is not here, for He is risen, just as He said. The second is simply the notion of waking up from sleep. This is the word used when Joseph wakes up from his dream with the angel, or when the disciples try to wake up Jesus in the middle of the storm.

I think there are allusions to both meanings here for Paul. I think on the one hand, he’s acknowledging the truth of Romans 6:4

Romans 6:4 LSB

Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.

Christ was raised, we are raised with him. In that sense, the hour is here for us to “get up!” Indeed we have already “gotten up” by faith in Christ.

On the other hand, he is also exhorting the believer to wake up in the sense that they are to get up, to be on the alert, to wake up and shake off the cobwebs as it were.

Paul adds another layer of reasoning: we are to walk in love by fulfilling the Law because salvation is nearer to us than when we believed.

It’s important to distinguish here what Paul means by salvation. First, we need to understand the context of other parts of Scripture that mention this idea of awakening from sleep.

The best place to go accurately understand Paul’s meaning here is 1 Thessalonians 5:1-6

1 Thessalonians 5:1–6 LSB

Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need of anything to be written to you. For you yourselves know full well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night. While they are saying, “Peace and safety!” then destruction will come upon them suddenly like labor pains upon a woman who is pregnant, and they will never escape. But you, brothers, are not in darkness, that the day would overtake you like a thief, for you are all sons of light and sons of day. We are not of night nor of darkness; so then let us not sleep as others do, but let us be awake and sober.

Do you hear the parallels through here? Knowing the times, light and darkness, awake and sober. But what does this specifically concern in verse 2? The day of the Lord. Now what is the day of the Lord? The day of the Lord is a common signifier of the final event of human history before we enter into the eternal state. It is the glorious return of Christ when He will once again step foot on the earth, this time not as meek and mild servant, but as a conquering judge.

What happens to Christians at the day of the Lord? We enter into the joy and glory of our master. This is what we call glorification, or final salvation. The near salvation of Romans 13:11 is the day of the Lord, a day of reckoning for the unbeliever but a day of joy and salvation for those who are in Christ.

What Paul saying then is this: fulfill the law by loving one another, because Christ’s return is imminent. It is near.

How near is it? Paul uses an apt illustration for us. He says the night is almost gone and the day is at hand.

The Biblical authors portray the eternal state as a place of perpetual day.

Revelation 21:25 LSB

And its gates will never be closed by day, for there will be no night there;

So what Paul is saying then is fulfill the law by walking in love because the night is passing away and the day is dawning.

If you’re an early riser like I am, you often wake up during what is called twilight. This is the time right before the sun officially rises, or breaks the horizon, but the sun is still providing light, and that light is getting brighter and brighter and stronger and stronger until it finally peaks over the horizon and you now walk in the full light of day. That’s called twilight, and that’s what Paul is visualizing for us here. Darkness is gone, the full dawn is coming, but before it comes we are still blessed to be able to walk in the light of twilight. For Paul, Christians who live between the first and second comings of Christ are living in the Twilight Zone. And that’s really what this is. The darkness of evil is slowly but surely passing away and giving way to the light of Christ, which will peak over the horizon of history at his second coming and will break forth into full and eternal day. And then like John says, we will have no need of the sun, or the moon, or stars, for we will bask in the fullness of His light for eternity.

But one dawning implies another. The dawning of light, for Paul, implied the donning of light. If the light is coming, and is indeed on the very edge of the horizon of history, as light-walker, to borrow a phrase from our 1 John study, Christians must arm themselves with light.

This word here translated armor is the Greek word hoplon. It actually doesn’t really refer to armor so much as it refers to weapons or instruments of warfare. If you’re an astute student of history, you might recognize that word hoplon. It’s from the same root as we get the word hoplite, which is what the ancient Greeks called the infantrymen.

These hoplites were the Navy SEALs of ancient Greece. Armed with the most advanced tools, weaponry, and armor, they were the pride of Alexander’s armies when Greece was at the height of it’s power. For Paul to urge Christians to emulate hoplites is a powerful statement. It is to urge strength, discipline, teamwork, and a sense of duty.

Paul contrasts the night with the day in three ways then.

To walk in the day, having donned the armor of light, is to walk properly and to put on the Lord Jesus Christ.

To walk in the night, having donned the deeds of darkness, is to carouse, drink, fornicate, strive, and envy, and make provision for the flesh and it’s lusts.

To put on the armor of light and stand in opposition to the darkness is therefore to walk properly, decently, in order, and it is to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. What does it mean to put on the Lord Jesus Christ?

This is a favorite phrase of Paul’s, occurring here, as well as in Galatians, Ephesians, and Colossians. In all four contexts, it appears that Paul has in view here one of the critical components of our salvation: conversion. Paul admonishes us to, at every stage of our life, be in a continual pattern of laying aside the deeds of darkness and putting on Jesus Christ. For Paul, we are both then converted in the past tense and also converting in the present tense. The life of the Christian ought to be marked by a perpetual laying aside of darkness and putting on of Christ.

Paul gets specific with what Christians are to put off: carousing, drunkenness, sexual promiscuity, sensuality, strife, jealousy. Carousing is cause a ruckus. It is quite literally the opposite of proper behavior earlier in verse 13. It is improper, indecent, and disorderly behavior. Paul purposely positions carousing with drunkenness because the two often come together. Drunk people tend to carouse. Sexual promiscuity and sensuality are paired together as well, with sensuality being a love for wanton physical pleasure, and sexual promiscuity being the typical way in which humans typically indulge in a lust for physical pleasure. Finally, strife and jealousy are paired together, and again, the second part of the pair gives way to the first. Jealousy always leads to strife. An insatiable desire for that which belongs to someone else will inevitably lead first to internal strife and turmoil, and then it breaks out into the relationship when you start disliking someone else for what they have or who they are or what they’ve been given.

So Paul effectively gives us a three-fold picture of the ethical orientation of the Christian: Christians are to be marked by loving, lawful, light-like behavior, and this ethical picture summarizes all that Paul has taught us from Romans 12:1 onward.

I want to move now into a discussion of some of the principles that Paul teaches us here, followed by some practical exhortations.

Principles

#1 - Love is the Christian’s eternal obligation

Christians are to be as obligation- and debt-free as possible. We are to pay what we owe and do to so quickly. But the obligation to love one another is ceaseless, and indeed will last into eternity.

1 Corinthians 13:8–13 LSB

Love never fails, but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away. When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child. When I became a man, I did away with childish things. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. But now abide faith, hope, love—these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Jonathan Edwards provides helpful insight:

Heaven Is a World of Love (Crossway Short Classics) Heaven Is a World of Love

From the first of these verses, I have already drawn the doctrine that that great fruit of the Spirit in which the Holy Ghost shall not only for a season, but everlastingly, be communicated to the church of Christ is charity or divine love. And now I would consider the same verse in connection with the two that follow it, and upon the three verses would make two observations.

First, that it is mentioned as one great excellence of charity, that it shall remain when all other fruits of the Spirit have failed.

Second, that this will come to pass in the perfect state of the church, when that which is in part shall be done away and that which is perfect is come.

For Paul, the Christian obligation of love is so great and so endless that even when faith and hope pass away on the day of the Lord, when our faith is made sight and our hope is realized, love will not cease. Love will not pass away. Our obligation to keep the two great commandments will continue on into eternity, making heaven, as Jonathan Edwards so famously put it, a world of love.

#2 Love is the Christian’s most pressing obligation

Connected with our first principle, our second is like it, but perhaps more present. Paul positions love for neighbor as the single item of concern and focus for the Christian, ethically speaking. Love ought to be central in all that we do.

John Calvin commented:

Commentary on the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Romans Chapter 13

Paul’s design is to reduce all the precepts of the law to love, so that we may know that we then rightly obey the commandments, when we observe the law of love, and when we refuse to undergo no burden in order to keep it.

Paul succinctly summarizes in 1 Corinthians 16:14

1 Corinthians 16:14 LSB

Let all that you do be done in love.

#3 Love is expressed in the fulfillment of the Law

Here we have an important principle and one that has fallen out of favor in many of our circles today.

Many Christians today will say that it doesn’t matter what we do, because Jesus came and fulfilled the law and replaced the law with love and so we don’t have to do anything other than just love one another. If you press these people hard, you’ll typically find that for them, love is best defined by the Beatles in their song “All You Need Is Love.” Of course, if you go and listen to that song, you’ll find that the typical definition of love just has to do with feelings. How do I feel? I feel good? Oh wow, that’s love.

If you want to get your definition of love from a far better band than the Beatles, go listen to the hit 1992 single Luv is a Verb by dc Talk. There you will find these lyrics:

Hey, tell me haven’t you heard?

Love is a serious word.

Hey, I think it’s time you learned

I don’t care whatcha seen,

I don’t care whatcha heard,

The word love, love is a verb.

There’s a lot to be learned from those lines. Love is a serious word, love is a verb, and what you hear and see in the media and in the world and tragically even in the church is likely not an accurate representation of what love truly is.

Biblically, love is a verb. Love requires action. And what are those actions? They are summarized in the Ten Commandments, and Paul affirms here that all commandments, both Old and New Testament, pour forth out of this single command to love your neighbor.

This is what theologians refer to as the third use of the Law as summarized in the Ten Commandments. The first use is to restrain evil behavior. The second is to teach the sinner the depth and nature of their sin as it offends a holy God. Finally, the third use of the Law is as guide and rule for life as a Christian. I have found nowhere a better explanation of this concept that Chapter 19 of the Westminster Confession of Fatih, which I will read now in it’s entirety:

The Westminster Confession of Faith: Edinburgh Edition Chapter XIX. Of the Law of God

GOD gave to Adam a law, as a covenant of works, by which he bound him, and all his posterity, to personal, entire, exact, and perpetual obedience; promised life upon the fulfilling, and threatened death upon the breach of it; and endued him with power and ability to keep it.

II. This law, after his fall, continued to be a perfect rule of righteousness; and, as such, was delivered by God upon mount Sinai in ten commandments, and written in two tables; the first four commandments containing our duty towards God, and the other six our duty to man.

III. Besides this law, commonly called Moral, God was pleased to give to the people of Israel, as a church under age, ceremonial laws, containing several typical ordinances; partly of worship, prefiguring Christ, his graces, actions, sufferings, and benefits; and partly holding forth divers instructions of moral duties.e All which ceremonial laws are now abrogated under the new testament.

IV. To them also, as a body politic, he gave sundry judicial laws, which expired together with the state of that people, not obliging any other now, farther than the general equity thereof may require.

V. The moral law doth for ever bind all, as well justified persons as others, to the obedience thereof; and that not only in regard of the matter contained in it, but also in respect of the authority of God, the Creator, who gave it.i Neither doth Christ in the gospel any way dissolve, but much strengthen this obligation.

VI. Although true believers be not under the law as a covenant of works, to be thereby justified or condemned; yet is it of great use to them, as well as to others; in that, as a rule of life, informing them of the will of God and their duty, it directs and binds them to walk accordingly;m discovering also the sinful pollutions of their nature, hearts, and lives; so as, examining themselves thereby, they may come to farther conviction of, humiliation for, and hatred against sin; together with a clearer sight of the need they have of Christ, and the perfection of his obedience.p It is likewise of use to the regenerate, to restrain their corruptions, in that it forbids sin; and the threatenings of it serve to show what even their sins deserve, and what afflictions in this life they may expect for them, although freed from the curse thereof threatened in the law.r The promises of it, in like manner show them God’s approbation of obedience, and what blessings they may expect upon the performance thereof, although not as due to them by the law as a covenant of works:t so as a man’s doing good, and refraining from evil, because the law encourageth to the one, and deterreth from the other, is no evidence of his being under the law, and not under grace.

VII. Neither are the forementioned uses of the law contrary to the grace of the gospel, but do sweetly comply with it; the Spirit of Christ subduing and enabling the will of man to do that freely and cheerfully which the will of God revealed in the law requireth to be done.x

If you want to know how to love someone, look to the Ten Commandments first, and then look beyond to every other interpersonal, horizontal command of Scripture.

#4 Christ’s law-fulfilling love is the motivation and model for our law-fulfilling love

To put this simply, Romans 13:8-10 does not exist without Matthew 5:17

Matthew 5:17 LSB

“Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill.

Jesus fulfilled the Law perfectly in His active obedience. From his birth to his death, at every point, His life was led in perfect obedience and submission to the Law, and more than that, He fulfilled it, or obeyed it completely in the Spirit, not merely in the letter.

Therefore, Christ’s active obedience serves as our motivation, the fuel, the power behind our obedience. We cannot obey without first trusting his perfect obedience on our behalf. Christ’s work removed the yoke of slavery to sin, taking away it’s penalty and power in our lives, thereby enabling us to freely and cheerfully comply with the requirements of the will of God.

Likewise, Christ’s active obedience serves as our model. This is what it means to be a disciple, a follower of Christ, indeed a Christian or little Christ. It is to emulate and model our behavior after his. It is to follow in His footsteps, take up His cross, and with joy and love render obedience to God’s laws.

#5 Christians love one another because we are living in the end times

We love because we know what time it is. We love because we are awake. We love because the dawn is coming, and we must be prepared.

I do not say that we live in the end times because of the evil that is happening in the world. I do not say that we are living in the end times because I think some great titular antichrist is imminently rising in our midst.

I say that we live in the end times because Jesus and Paul and John declared in unison that Christ’s ministry marked the beginning of the end. We are now in the final stage of history. That eschatological perspective has massive implications for us, according to Paul. If the light of love is coming, preparing to dawn in full day, then we must be prepared for that dawn by looking forward to that light, walking toward that light, walking in that light.

And for Paul and John and the rest of the Biblical authors, to walk in the light and to be a hoplite, armed with the light of Christ, is to simply obey the law of God by loving one another from a sincere heart.

As we said in our study of 1 John, by donning the armor of light and taking up arms against the darkness, we usher in the return of Christ.

As we said in our study of 1 Peter, by donning the armor of light and taking up arms against the darkness, we hasten the day of the Lord.

Christians have a real part to play in our eschatology. We do not merely watch and wait, though that is certainly part of our mandate. We are to actively press back against the darkness of our world, and do so by loving others in keeping with the law of God. So wake up, Christians. Get up from your slumber, for your salvation is near. Wake up and walk accordingly.

I now want to turn our attention to the second table of the Ten Commandments, so we can dig deeply into what Paul actually means when he tells us to fulfill the law by loving one another.

Practices

Exodus 20:12–17 LSB

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be prolonged in the land which Yahweh your God gives you. “You shall not murder. “You shall not commit adultery. “You shall not steal. “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife or his male slave or his female slave or his ox or his donkey or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”

If we want to love others, we have to start here.

Honor your father and mother. By extension, Moses is telling us to honor and respect all who are in authority. You want to love your boss? Respect him. You want to love the civil authorities around us? Respect them.

You shall not murder. If we reverse that, we are not to murder but we are to preserve life. Love preserves and propagates life. I’m going to say something that might sound radical here. We hear the phrase “love is love” touted all the time in regards to homosexual marriages and relationships. Let me tell you this. Homosexual marriages cannot propagate life. Biologically it is impossible. More than that, homosexual behaviors leads to all kinds of horrific diseases which cause premature death and prevent human flourishing on an individual and societal level. Effectively then, homosexual relationships cannot, ontologically, be relationships of true love because they are in violation of this command to preserve and propagate life. I recognize that this may be perceived as offensive, and indeed it is offensive to our 2023 American sensibilities, but I believe that homosexual relationships, in truth, are not relationships of love but relationships of hatred, in that they refuse to preserve and propagate life.

This command works itself out in other ways. What Christians should do and think about abortion is contained right here, namely, we should be actively and vehemently opposed to it and thereby preserve life. What Christians should do and think about reproduction and children is contained here, namely, Christians, if able, should have kids and lots of them and thereby propagate life.

You shall not commit adultery. Translation: preserve and propagate marriage, as designed by God. This goes back to the homosexuality discussion. Preserve marriage by refusing to participate in sexual activity apart from it. Propagate marriage by getting married and encouraging others to do the same. Preserve marriage by praying for marital fidelity for yourself and everyone you know. Propagate marriage by actively participating in the lives of your married friends and family and encourage them to love one another and be faithful to one another.

You shall not steal and you shall not covet. Translation: Preserve and propagate personal property. Christian love is anti-socialism and anti-communism. Preserve personal property by not stealing and by protecting and honoring the personal property of others. Propagate personal property through generosity. The opposite of stealing is giving. So give of all that you have and all that you are to others, and give generously, for God has commanded that you not steal.

You shall not bear false witness. Translation: preserve and propagate the truth. Preserve the truth by refusing to lie about anything or anyone at any time. Propagate the truth by being vocal about it. Tell people the truth at all times, even when it’s hard and even when it may come at great personal cost to you. To love someone is to tell them the truth, all the time, even when it hurts.

If you want to love others, start here. Preserve and propagate their life, their marriage, their stuff, and the truth.

I’ll close with a final word from Paul on how we are to do these things:

1 Corinthians 13:1–13 LSB

If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing. Love is patient, love is kind, is not jealous, does not brag, is not puffed up; it does not act unbecomingly, does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered; it does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; it bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails, but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away. When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child. When I became a man, I did away with childish things. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. But now abide faith, hope, love—these three; but the greatest of these is love.